JOLIE HOLLAND - CATALPA

Unless you knew any better, you’d swear this was an ancient field recording of an Appalachian Siren, coating the mountain wind with honey-thick cemetery fairy tales. A pale little girl in pigtails, molding her voice into the beautiful bell-chime it is by singing along to old Billie Holiday records, plucking a ukulele by campfire where the land and the stars are at their closest.
But it isn’t. It’s a demo of songs by Texan native Jolie Holland, initially intended for her old band, re-released by Anti- Records.
Holland takes a style of song made popular by the soundtrack to O Brother, Where Art Thou?, and presents it in its purest form, free of the studio slickness that enhanced the old-timey tunes of O Brother. She is a fearless griot, bouncing back and forth from sparse, stripped blues (“Black Hand Blues”) to hauntingly gloomy confessionals (“I Just Wanna Die”) to jazz-phrased sunny day picture-painting (“The Littlest Birds”). The song titles, sounds, and subjects stay unflinchingly loyal to their roots, and her unique, soothing voice bundles them all together into one humble little album.
Catalpa is a beautiful 12-song soundtrack for Fall, enough to hold you over until Holland’s new album makes its way out into the world.
LISTEN TO IT HERE.
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